The Ice Swan by J’nell Ciesielski

Should she knock? Of course she should. What an idiotic question. But knock on this door or the one from the sitting room dividing their personal chambers? Svetlana stopped pacing. She was acting like a . . . like a . . . Well, not like a duchess. Throwing her shoulders back, she firmly knocked on Wynn’s door.

“Come in.”

He stood barefoot in the center of the room wearing nothing more than gray trousers and a half-buttoned pale blue shirt. His unhitched suspenders hung down by his legs. Rubbing a towel over his wet head, his muscles rolled in graceful movement the length of his exposed forearms from where he’d turned back his shirt cuffs.

“Hand me one of the ties from the dresser, will you?” Wynn’s voice was muffled under the towel.

Tearing her eyes from the fit figure he cut, Svetlana crossed to the dresser and rummaged through the drawers until finding the neatly folded ties. Selecting a black one with tiny diamonds stitched into it, she handed it to him under the towel.

Wynn stopped rubbing his hair. “That’s not Larson’s hand.”

“No, it’s not.”

Flipping the towel to the back of his neck, Wynn grinned sheepishly at her. “Good. For a second there I thought you were my valet and my eyes were starting to go.” His fingers brushed hers as he took the tie from her. “And I’d hate not to see how pretty you are.”

She took a step back, away from his clean scent of rain and washed cotton, away from the vibrations circling them, away from the distracting patch of skin below his throat exposed by his unbuttoned shirt. She steered her gaze away to focus on anything else but him. Anything like the dark walnut walls and wainscoting, rich green drapes and comforter, masculine furniture that culminated in a massive bed taking up most of the far wall. Dear her, no. Anything but the bed and his exposed throat.

“I trust your bath was well?” She held back a groan. That was what she came up with to keep distractions away? “I mean, you’re refreshed from your travels?”

“It rained all the way from Calais to Edinburgh. I think I’ll still be wringing myself out three days from now.”

“It’s rained for nearly a week here.” Riveting. She might as well put him to sleep right then and there. She moved to the window and stared down at the soggy garden. The heart of winter and nary a color beyond gray and green to be found. Unlike the white nights of Russia where everything was singed blue and silver.

“Rain or not, I’m glad to have Scottish soil firmly beneath my feet again. Rocking boats aren’t for me.”

She traced a watery bead sloping down the pane. Unsteady in its descent, it stopped and stuttered, but never veered left or right as it continued in a singular direction. Much like her own path that hesitated and wavered yet with the gravitational force pushing her onward from necessity. Down the window drops collided and rushed onto a harmonious trajectory. Such was her life with Wynn, though time would tell if harmony was to direct their path. A path they had yet to discuss. Wars, revolutions, Bolsheviks, debts, and separation had demanded precedence in their whirlwind relationship up until this point. With no looming threats of disaster, what became of them now?

She caught Wynn’s reflection in the glass. What were his expectations? Best to find out now so that she might adjust hers accordingly.

“Now that you’re home, what will you do?”

“That’s something I’d like to discuss with you.”

She spun away from the window. “With me?”

His eyebrows lifted as if attempting to discern her confusion. “You’re my wife and I value your opinion. You should have a say on the direction we go.”

His wife. Her husband. Nerves tangled in her stomach. Husband and wife. That’s how marriages worked, but Mama had never instructed her on the possibility of being asked her opinion. “Your husband will tell you what to do,” Mama had repeated. “It is your duty to obey. Husbands and wives do not need a life together, merely ones that coexist.” A wife was to be an advisor only when asked, and even then it was to be agreeable to whatever the husband had already decided. Svetlana had laughed at that. What was the point in asking then? Wynn had never been a man for placating answers. Insincerity wasn’t one of his character flaws, and for that she was immensely grateful. It stood him apart from almost all other men she’d known.

“What would you like to discuss?”

Tossing his towel on the bed, he moved to his travel trunk and pulled out an envelope. “This came to me in Paris just before I departed. It’s an invitation to work at Glasgow Hospital. Apparently one of their surgeons attended the cardiology lecture I gave and was impressed by the new thinking. He’d like to explore it further in their surgeries. I would be put on an observation period with the potential for residency.”

“That’s wonderful! Congratulations.”

“They want me to come to Glasgow next week for a short interview and tour of the facilities. I thought you might like to come with me. See the city. Spend time together.”

“If that’s what you would like, then I’ll be happy to join you.”

“I want you to come because you want to come.”

Svetlana couldn’t stop the smile spreading across her face. “Then I’ll come.” His returning smile was all the confirmation she needed in knowing it was the right answer. And not because it was the agreeable answer to her lord and master, but because it seemed the right decision for them. Time together. Time to decide who they would be together in this marriage.

Of course, any conclusions would impact their duties as Duke and Duchess of Kilbride. The lumbering elephant in the room that could no longer be avoided.

“Have you given thought to Thornhill? A residency in Glasgow would take away your time needed here.”

Wynn’s smile faded. He turned and busied himself with stuffing shirts into a drawer. “Bruce Mackie is our estate agent. He’s been helping run this place since Father was here. He’ll keep everything in order unless I’m needed for the bigger decisions.”

“As the duke I think you’re needed here for more than just the big decisions.”

“More than at hospital? Advances are being made every day to save lives through cardiology. I can’t help bring about change stuck on an estate collecting rent.”

Svetlana frowned. “There are responsibilities here.”

“I also have responsibilities to my profession. I can’t abandon one for the other. This is all new to me, trying to balance physician with landowner.” He grimaced as if he couldn’t bring himself to claim the title duke. “We’ll figure it out.”

He may have wanted her opinion on the direction of their life, but now was not the time for an argument. Besides, what would she be arguing for? Both responsibilities were important, and as he said, abandoning one would bring devastation to the other. Unless there was a way for them to coexist. It needed some thought, but in the meantime, they would see what the physicians in Glasgow had to say.

“I’ve been reading over your family and estate history,” she said, shifting topics to regain the easiness they’d had moments before. Before he’d felt cornered. “The MacCallans have been well favored over the centuries. This land is said to have once belonged to the ancient Celtic gods who used it as hunting grounds.”

Wynn laughed as he set his shaving kit on the bureau. Where was his valet to do the unpacking? Then again, knowing Wynn he wouldn’t want the fuss.

“I’d nearly forgot about those stories. Our horse master used to tell us about them, claiming he got them from his old gran who once served as a Druid priestess. Back in the old days before the earth rounded and stags and wolves big as mountains roamed the wild woods. It would take arrows as tough and long as oak trees to bring them down. Where they fell they left valleys.”

“We have similar stories in Russia, but with bears. They, too, were tall as trees.”

“Did you ever see one?”

“Once at the Peterhof Palace. He wasn’t as tall as a tree, but his fur was thick and black like coal. There were also zebras, an elephant, two tigers, peacocks, and a camel. Russian nobility loves extravagance.” Or did. Those days were long over. Whatever became of the poor creatures?

“We don’t have elephants or camels, but I can show you where the king of red stags supposedly fell and all the Druids in Scotland came to mourn him and curse the hag who shot the arrow.”

“What kind of curse?”

“They turned her to the stone of a mountain and now she cries great waterfall tears to create Loch Dunwan. It smells like sulphur. I wouldn’t advise going near it, but the valley is splendid. Come June, the heather is thick enough to walk across. In winter, ice crystals collect on the ferns growing near the river. As the water rushes over them, the ice thickens and drags the branches to the bottom.”

“How beautiful. Seasons paint masterpieces on nature, always changing. Yet remaining the same year after year.”

“I’ll take you to see it once the rain stops.”

“I’d like that.” For the first time in months, possibly since she’d left Russia, her heart danced in delight. Memories of happiness in simple pleasures had been suffocated beneath the terror of survival for so long, she had doubted they would ever surface again. Much less the possibility of feeling so happy. Yet, once more, Wynn offered her hope.

Before she could dwell further on the meanings behind that thought and the warmth it stirred within her, she crossed the room to the door.

“I better allow you to finish dressing before you catch pneumonia.”

“You can’t catch pneumonia from being cold. It’s an infection that fills the lungs with fluid.”

“Chills, then.”

“At the moment I don’t feel any chills.”

She wasn’t either with the way he was looking at her. Silhouetted against the orange glow of the fireplace behind him, he seemed larger than she remembered, shoulders wider and chest broader with arm muscles filling out the sleeves of his shirt. She remembered feeling those arms around her, holding her close, protecting her against the onslaught of fears. With the way he looked at her now, she knew he wouldn’t deny her stepping into his embrace once more. A darkening of the eyes, a parting of the lips, a concentration of the brow. It was a look to be recognized by a woman in a man and within her power to do what she willed with it.

What did she want to do with it? She’d become his wife under duress, but now that the danger had passed, they found themselves treading unfamiliar waters. Should she ignore the pulling look in his eyes and swim back to the shallows, or give in to the swell of emotion and strike out to deeper waters with him? She was no longer sure where the boundary of safety tethered. With a desperate need for stability, that uncertainty was enough to frighten her.

Her hand fumbled for the doorknob.

“You can use the other door.” He pointed to the door that connected his chambers to hers through the private sitting room. The desire stirring in his eyes blinked away.

She tried not to give in to the disappointment at his polite change in expression. She had made the decision to step back, and like the gentleman he was, Wynn was respecting it. Would she mind so terribly if he threw politeness to the wind and closed the distance between them?

“I didn’t want to make a habit of entering your room that way. That is, I mean to say, I don’t wish to intrude on your privacy.” She twisted the knob. She needed to get out before her rambling carried her away.

“You’ll never intrude, Svetlana. Not at my door. It is always open for you. All you have to do is step through.”

She did step through. Out and into the hall before he carried her right into those deep waters where she no longer knew if she was drowning or floating.